Second Sun
Second Sun is the thirteenth level of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. Walkthrough You start out from just seconds before you left off in Of Their Own Accord where Pvt. Ramirez's team has just been shot down and are now defending their position. As Russian forces approach you, a search light whites out the screen, then you play as Sat1, an unnamed astronaut on an EVA mission. Houston then asks you to look toward the dark side of the Earth for a bogey (the SLBM that Captain Price launched). The minority of the level is simply observing the missile's path until it eventually detonates in the atmosphere. The shockwave soon reaches the ISS and destroys the station while Sat1 is thrown into space before he is hit by a solar panel. The explosion causes an EMP that blacks out most of the East Coast, but it also saves the lives of many U.S. Army Rangers back in Washington D.C. Aerial vehicles start to fall from the sky as your team makes way for a building to take shelter. After everything goes quiet, a runner tells the team to get to Whiskey Hotel. After plowing through some remaining Russian personnel in an office building, you get to the President's bunker on the East Wing. Trivia *In the briefing part of the level, Shepherd is talking to the Secretary of Defense about the ICBM in-coming to possibly destroy Washington D.C., stating that "we've rebuilt it before, we can rebuild it again". This is a reference to the War of 1812 between the U.S. and Great Britain, in which the British burned down the White House. Since then, however, America and Britain have never fought against each other in a war and have, in fact, been close allies since the First World War to the present, with the War in Iraq and the War in Afghanistan being prime examples. *The part where you control Sat1 was supposed to be in a separate level/interactive cutscene called "International Space Station", similar to The Coup and Aftermath. It was merged with this level in the final version of the game. *Strangely, after the EMP goes off your Holographic sight is immediately disabled while the helicopter and lights are still active. *While the concept of a low-orbit Nuke detonating and causing a wide-spread EMP is feasible, no shockwave would ever reach since the ISS at Perigee is at 341 km altitude; however, the station would eventually be damaged by the electromagnetic pulse, and the heat from the nuke can damage the ISS, or even ignite the oxygen on board. *This is the only level, besides No Russian, that contains no intel. *This is the only level where you control two characters within the same level. * When you get to the President's bunker under the Eisenhower building Cpl. Dunn says he thought it was under the West wing, but Sgt. Foley says that one's for tourists and it must be the real thing. In a real map, the Eisenhower Building is actually west of the White House. When you start the next level, Whiskey Hotel, you somehow start east of the White House when in this level you ended west. *When Foley throws you a magazine for your gun while you are trapped in the helicopter, the previous magazine given to you by Pvt. Wade disappears mysteriously. This most likely happens because Ramirez is supposed to use all of the magazine. *Ramirez sustained extremely severe injuries on both of his hands, yet this does not affect his aiming or use of weapons in the slightest. The gashes can be seen through out the level Second Sun when reloading or switching weapons. However, in the next level Whiskey Hotel it seems that they have been treated and/or he has been issued a new pair of gloves. *The player cannot remain outside, despite avoiding the helicopters. If they look up, they will see a never ending amount of helicopters falling from the sky (from altitudes no normal helicopter would fly at). One of these, a Little Bird, will actually "track" the player and will always crash close enough to kill them, regardless of where they are on the street. *The in game appearance of ISS is modeled after the configuration the station was in from 2002-2005. The current configuration (as of November 2009) is different, in that the Station is slightly larger with the second node and the European and Japanese labs installed, and the P6 Solar Arrays have been relocated from the top of the Z1 truss as seen in game to the port side of ISS, with another set of solar arrays on the starboard side. The 2009 configuration is actually close to how the station will look when completed in 2011. *The astronaut in the ISS scene appears to be grappled to some sort of a satellite. Such a spacewalk would be impossible to conduct from ISS, as all spacewalks conducted on ISS are tethered, where the astronaut is connected physically to the station, and it would be impractical to investigate a satellite from the ISS. *The crew of ISS as seen in game appear to be American. As ISS is an international venture, there are typically astronauts from all nations on board, and every ISS crew to date has had at least one Russian astronaut (or "cosmonaut"). It's possible with the political situation in Russia, space flights to ISS were suspended, although 2 Russian Soyuz spacecraft can be seen docked to the station. However, the spacecraft being docked is entirely plausible as the Soyuz are launched on a six month basis (thus would have been launched just prior to the unrest) and remain up there until just before the next craft is launched for use as "escape pods" in case of an emergency. *When inside the office, the copy machines still have a light on, even though the EMP supposedly wiped out all electronics. *At one part in the level you kill 3 men trying to open what looks like a fried BTR-80, After you kill the men Cpl. Dunn says, "What about the men inside?" Sgt. Foley responds, "What about 'em?" If you listen closely you can hear Russian Soldiers banging on the walls and saying something in Russian. They only say this once when triggered and they do not speak again after. Dunn's remark about the Russians in the BTR could be a nod to earlier Call of Duty installments. In earlier titles, allied characters would always finish off a stricken vehicle by throwing a grenade down the hatch. However another possible alternative reason is that because the BTR's doors open electronically (bad design for emergency escapes). The Russians inside are trapped inside a steel coffin, and will probably suffocate slowly. *Also, if the player fires at the BTR prematurely, the Russian soldiers both inside and outside the vehicle will not notice. *Whether or not this goes throughout the entire game, when you are given the M4A1 at the beginning of the level, you can see for a brief moment that it has retained its iron-sights even though it is attached to a holographic sight. However as soon as you pick it up from the soldier giving it to you, it turns into what a M4A1 with holographic sights should look like, meaning the iron-sights disappear. *After leaving the building where you take shelter from the falling helicopters, if you look at the newspost, the headline for the newspapers is"Call of Duty 2". *Dunn is the first to notice optic are offline, mentioning that "My Red Dot's down." However, if you look at his weapon, you'll see he is actually using a Thermal Scope. *Also Dunn's Thermal Scope appears to be still working. *When helicopters are falling from the sky, you have unlimited sprint. Interestingly, you don't have unlimited sprint when replaying the level on the PC version. *If you look carefully, the Ranger that gives you a weapon after the crash is different from the one that gave you the weapon in the mission Of Their Own Accord, this is because Pvt. Wade's appearance is random. *It is interesting to note that the only person using a Red Dot attachment is Ramirez. However, Dunn and another Ranger have a conversation about their red dots not working when their weapons have different attachments. *It is odd how the soldiers trying to get the soldiers out of the BTR don't even hear the gunfire happening in the office building less than 100 Meters from their position. However, there was torrential rainfall in the area at the time. *It is strange that near the area where Foley sees several unidentified soldiers near the bus, there is a pick-up truck which on the back has a twisted remains of a WWII-era M1919 Browning Machinegun. It is possible that the pick-up truck armed with a machinegun was used by local civilian resistance to defend themselves against the Russian forces. *Many of the buildings in this level and the next level have pictures of William Henry Harrison, the President with the shortest Term after dying in only a month in Office. *If you try to throw a grenade at the beginning of the level, it will say "No M2 Frag Grenades" just like in S.S.D.D. *An interesting thing to note is that before the EMP wave hits, thered dot is already down. *The aircraft on the street ahead that Cpl. Dunn comments on is a Boeing 777-200ER, which ironically is a fly-by-wire aircraft. Category:Levels Category:Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Single-Player Levels Category:Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2